Operation Safed Sagar: The Untold Story of the Kargil War - Netflix Series

Operation Safed Sagar: The Untold Story of the Kargil War | Official Trailer | Netflix India
Netflix India

Pakistan and India have been fighting over Kashmir since forever. It's basically been a stalemate, but back in 1999 Pakistan got a bee in their bonnet and decided to push a little harder.

I was looking for a map of the area but I'm not finding anything that's making me happy, but then I noticed we've got the Indus River running through the area. This video lays essential ground work if you want to understand what's going on here:

Indus River explained in under 3 minutes
FactSpark

Kashmir is basically a bunch of snow covered mountains. Every spring the Indian and Pakistan armies advance into Kashmir and approach the Line of Control. In 1999 Pakistan decides to advance early and pushes past the Line of Control into territory normally held by India. Now things get hot and the Indian Army is having a tough time so the Indian Air Force gets called in to see if they can do something about it.

This show is basically an Indian version of Top Gun expanded into a series. It's pretty good. The shots of the jets are wonderful and the scenes of domestic life are not too tedious, so it's fine.

There are some very tense scenes of jet fighters zooming through canyons in the Himalayas. Sometimes these scenes get very intense, although if you look at it objectively the scenes are impossible. Jet fighters do not sideslip at 45 degrees when they are traveling at 500 knots, but the scenes are so well crafted that you get carried along emotionally. So now you are watching a scene that is simultaneously believable and unbelievable. Great stuff.

Indian Air Force MiG-21

The show focuses on the Golden Arrows squadron. They are flying MiG-21 jet fighter aircraft. They start off flying photo reconnaissance missions but because they are equipped with GPS they soon get tasked with bombing those dirty Pakistanis. It is an Indian movie after all. The show makes a big deal about altitude, and while the Himalayas are tall, the MiG can easily go much, much higher.

Specifications (MiG-21bis)
Length	50	feet
Wingspan	24	feet
Weight: 10 tons	19	tons
Maximum speed	1,350	mph
Landing speed	160	mph
Range	410	miles
Service ceiling	57,000	feet
Guns	1	internal 23 mm Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-23L autocannon with 200 rounds
Hardpoints	4	underwing
Hardpoints	1	ventral, reserved for fuel droptanks

Can't mention Kashmir without mentioning Led Zeppelin:

Led Zeppelin - Kashmir (Remaster) (Official Audio)
Led Zeppelin

Report from Bingen

Silent RR Crossing

Iowa Man came to town today so we had lunch at Longbottoms. We were talking about the advantages of living in Bingen (which is across the Columbia River from Hood River) versus living in the big city. Rent, as you might expect, is cheaper. Grocery stores are few, scattered and cost a bit more. 

The thing that caught my attention is the trains - 50 trains a day. There are three crossings where the train has to blow its horn, and if you are nearby those horns are loud. I've been out to Bingen a couple of times, but I don't remember the trains being a big deal. But then I was only there for a few hours. Iowa Man survives by stuffing silicon earplugs in his ears.

Anyway, Bingen is supposed to be getting a Quiet Zone. Iowa Man was telling me a silent crossing involves concrete barriers to keep cars from evading the crossing gates and probably some other requirements. Looking around for a picture, this is the only one I could find. It is the splash panel that shows up when YoiTube displays a list of videos. Play the associated video and this image is nowhere to be found. This is a screenshot that I uploaded to Google Photos to crop because my Windows image viewer won't crop images anymore. All I get is a black image. Probably need more memory. I wonder if older memory would be cheaper that the latest stuff that is costing 10x more than it was a year ago.

Hood River Bridge

The 100 year old bridge over the Columiba River is going to be replaced, or at least they are talking about replacing it. That's kind of the way it goes with people. Before anyone does anything, everyone has to discuss it and discuss it at length.

Hood River Bridge

Looking at that first picture of the bridge reminds me of just how wide the Columbia River is at that point. The bridge is almost a mile long, and remember, this isn't one of your long, lazy flatland rivers, at this point the Columbia is rolling along at two miles per hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It don't stop for nobody or nuttin'.

Insitu FLARES and INTEGRATOR drones

Insitu is building drones in Bingen. It was bought out by Boeing and now it is being absorbed by ACHR, one of the air-taxi guys. Since our skies will soon be filled with flying air-taxis, does this mean that Bingen will become the Detroit of the 21st Century?

Cunningham-Hall PT-6 biplane with Mount Hood

There is a big antique car and airplane museum in Hood River - WAAAM - the Western Antique Aeroplane and Automobile Museum. The museum was founded in 2007 which might explain why I have never heard of it. I don't know how many vehicles they have on display but the list on Wikipedia takes 17 screens. The museum itself covers five acres. Iowa Man recommends riding in the cart.

Custom map of the Hood River area made for this post.

Russia in Syria

Tupolev Tu-22M3 Khmeimim Air Base in Syria

Just a cool photo. The Tu-22M is a big airplane. Selected specs from Wikipedia:

• 140 feet long
• variable sweep wings go from 112 feet to 76 feet
• weighs 60 tons empty
• 1200 MPH top speed
• Russia might have 500 of these aircraft

Khmeimim Air Base in Syria

DeltaHawk Engines

AirVenture 2026: DeltaHawk Shows More Engines, Applications
AvBrief

I'm surprised I haven't heard of this outfit before. 'First clean-sheet airplane engine design in 60 years' or something like that. Saw the phrase on the DeltaHawk Engines website, but I lost my place and I can't find it now.

The engines are turbo-super-charged, two-stroke diesels. They are aluminum and water cooled. They run on jet-fuel, which kind of makes sense, the amount of fuel jets throw away (like when they are overweight coming in for a landing) probably dwarfs the amount of fuel recreational pilots use. I like 100 octane avgas, just on account of I like gasoline engines. I'm not keen on diesels, they're noisy and they smell. I suppose gasoline engines smell as well, but I like that smell. I don't like the smell of diesel fuel.

With the turbo-super-charging and the water cooling, they need a whole lot of external plumbing for both air and water. There is going to be an intercooler for the output of the turbocharger on it's way to the engine intake. I wonder if you need a second intercooler for the supercharger. That would make it really complicated.

Anyway, good on them for creating a new engine and bringing it to market. They want $110,000 for four cylinder, but I think that's a complete drive package - i.e. everything from the firewall forward.

I'm wondering who they are going to sell these too. They need a sizeable market in order to make this project worth-while, and I don't think the eleventy-eleventy home builders are going to be enough. But then there are all kinds of puddle jumper airlines all over the world, and they would probably love to have these engines.

China Airlines Flight 120 - 19 Years Ago

The 737 continued to burn uncontrolled until the tail collapsed to the ground - Xinhua

Uniberp came out to visit last week. He stopped in Seattle and gave us this report:

We attended an interesting presentation at the Museum of Flight, given by a retired engineer at Boeing, who worked on the investigation into the fire on China Airlines Flight 120, which caught fire on the ground and all persons escaped.

He described the design that resulted in a loose bolt from a leading edge flap puncturing the wing tank when the flap was retracted. The investigation resulted in a changed design to the flap that eliminated a micro-fine control of the flap movement, concluding the extra complexity was not worth the miniscule performance improvement.

He said "Those aerodynamicists, they use every trick they can, no matter how complex it makes it for engineering. One millimeter gap, ooooh we must do something." He was kind of dismissive of them.

Most of the docents seemed to be old retired Boeing guys.

Wikipedia has a page about this.

By the time the fire was extinguished, most of the plane had been destroyed - Mayday

Diagram of slat extension mechanism

Bolt that punctured the fuel tank

Nakajima Ki-87

Threatening Skies - Antonis Karidis
Nakajima Ki-87 high-altitude fighter attacking a B-29 Superfortress

Japan started working on the Nakajima Ki-87 well before the B-29 appeared, but they only managed to construct one prototype before the war ended, so it never saw combat.

Previous post about the Nakajima Aircraft Company.
Previous posts about the B-29.

Image is from the cover for a plastic model kit.

P-51 Mustang

Miss Helen - North American P-51D Mustang

From Warbird Aviation:

P-51D Mustang “Miss Helen” was delivered to the US Army Air Force (USAAF) in 1945 where she saw active service in World War II with 352 Fighter Group (FG) ‘The Blue Nosed Bastards of Bodney’, and has several confirmed kills to her name. ​She was flown by Capt. Raymond Littge as ‘Miss Helen’ and by later by Lt. Russell Ross as ‘Miss Nita’. Today wearing the same paint scheme as she did in 1945 and is the last original 352nd Fighter Group P-51 known to exist. 352 FG flew nearly 60,000 combat hours in just 19 months of WWII, claiming 519 enemy aircraft destroyed in the air, 287 on the ground and produced 26 aces for losses of 118 aircraft. Her full name is ‘P-51D-20NA 44-72216’ and when she was delivered to Capt. Littge he already had a kill tally of 10.5, including an Me 262.

It’s uncertain exactly how many missions Littge flew in Miss Helen but it’s known for sure that he flew her on a mission escorting B-17 bombers to the marshalling yards in Dresden on April 17th 1945, along with another 51 Mustangs. ​They came across an airfield at Platting with about 70 parked aircraft and Littge made an astonishing seven passes, destroying three Me 109s and 2 Me262s on the ground, despite having been hit in the initial attack on enemy flak positions which nearly emptied his oil tank.

​She’s passed through several hands since the War, including those of the Royal Swedish Air Force and Israeli Air Force, starred in the Hollywood film Memphis Belle, and is now owned by Robert Tyrrell and based at the Boultbee Flight Academy at Goodwood Aerodrome.

Several earlier posts about the P-51.

To the Stratosphere

Solar-powered fixed-wing aircraft attached to a high-altitude balloon -  Ondirae Abdullah-Robinson

Defence Blog reports:

U.S. Army soldiers attached a solar-powered fixed-wing aircraft to a high-altitude balloon at Orote Airfield on Naval Station Guam on June 24, 2026, and prepared to launch the combination into the stratosphere as part of Valiant Shield 2026, the largest U.S.-led joint exercise in the Indo-Pacific.

This aircraft can cruise indefinitely at an altitude of 60,000 feet, which is 50% higher than commercial airliners. This is like U-2 territory (U-2 can reach 70,000 feet). Spy satellites will only have a specific spot on Earth visible for like ten minutes out of every 90 minute orbit, plus you only need a conventional radio to talk to an aircraft, not a specialized satellite communicator. Not sure why you can't use a conventional radio to talk to a satellite. Maybe because spy satellites have low power transmitters so you need a directional antennae to pick up their signal.

Previous posts about balloons and high altitude.

Focke-Wulf Fw190D-9 Mimetall

Focke-Wulf Fw190D-9 Mimetall
Image is from IGB model

Germany built over 20,000 of these fighter aircraft during WW2. Mimetall refers to the Mimetall GmbH factory in Erfurt, Germany, which manufactured the Focke-Wulf Fw 190D-9 fighter during the final stages of World War II.

Re-2000

Re-2000 fighters Royal Hungarian Air Force

Reggiane Re.2000 Falco I was a minor player in WW2. It was designed and initially built in Italy. Italy made almost 200 of these airplanes. Hungary made 200 more under license. Performance was good in 1940 - speed of 300 MPH and altitude of 30,000 feet, but it was soon outclassed.

Hungarian Air Force Reggiane Re.2000 Heja of 1/1 'Dongo' squadron
Zoran Petek

Reggiane Re.2000 Falco (Svenska Flygvapnet J 20)
silvan500

Lavochkin La-9

Lavochkin La-9

I did a jigsaw puzzle of this image this afternoon, but it was watermarked with AIRLINERS.NET, and I'm not gonna post that here. Asked Google to identify it because the label on the puzzle was entirely cryptic, and Google found the same image, sans watermark, on Ebay, so that's what we have here.

I had never heard of Lavochkin before. I've heard of Antonov, Beriev, Ilyushin, MiG, Sukoi, Tupolev & Yakovlev, but not Lavochkin. The company is still in business and is kind of a big deal.

Wikipedia:

The Lavochkin La-9 (NATO reporting name Fritz) was a Soviet fighter aircraft produced shortly after World War II. It was one of the last piston engined fighters to be produced before the widespread adoption of the jet engine.

The Lavochkin La-9 descended from the La-7 which descended from the La-5. The Soviets built many of these aircraft:

Model	Year	Quantity
La-9	1946	1,600
La-7	1944	6,000
La-5	1942	10,000

Lavochkin. The Evolution of a Fighter.
KOC1

B-26 Marauder

South African Air Force B-26 Marauders over Italy - Darryl Legg

We built over 5,000 B-26 Marauders. They had the lowest loss rate of any U.S. Army Air Forces bomber.

Google:

During World War II, the South African Air Force (SAAF) operated five squadrons of Martin B-26 Marauder medium bombers in the Mediterranean Theater. Flying predominantly from temporary steel-plate airfields in Italy, the SAAF flew crucial missions targeting Axis infrastructure and supporting Allied campaigns.

A Brief History of "Flak-Bait"
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum

USAAF B-26 Marauder pilot buzzed the flight deck of Akagi to save his crew
Aviation Wings

Double Header Marauder Operations
AP Archive

Bristol Beaufighter Mk VI

Bristol Beaufighter Mk VI
Image from Tamiya scale model kit

Bristol Beaufighter TFX

The prototype flew on 17 July 1939 and the first production Beaufighters were delivered to the Royal Air Force in the following April. The type was the first high performance night fighter equipped with airborne interception radar and successfully operated against the German night raids in the winter of 1940-1941. Later the Beaufighter was introduced into Coastal Command as a strike fighter. Its original formidable gun armament was retained but rockets and torpedoes were added giving it an even greater fire power.

Not only did the Beaufighter operate with distinction in North West Europe but also a considerable reputation was earned in the Middle and Far East.

5562 Beaufighters had been produced by the time the last one was delivered in September 1945 and fifty-two operational Royal Air Force squadrons had been equipped with the type.

Bristol Beaufighter

Beaufighter crews accounted for over half of the Luftwaffe bombers shot down during the Blitz.

 

Bristol Hercules Sleeve Valve Engine

The Beaufighter was powered by a pair of Bristol Hercules 14-cylinder, air-cooled, sleeve-valve, radial piston engines, 1,600 hp each. The Hercules was followed by the Centaurus, which also used sleeve valves.

How This Underrated British Aircraft Helped Win The Pacific War
IsonzoEnjoyer

Daring Solo Beaufighter Raid - Paris 1942
Mark Felton Productions

B-29 Superfortress & Iwo Jima

Iwo Jima: A Hard Won Haven by John Shaw

Iwo Jima as a crucial emergency landing site for crippled bombers returning from missions over Japan. It is estimated that these emergency landing strips saved the lives of nearly 25,000 American airmen during the war. - Google

A B29 Bombing Mission Is Interrupted by Japanese Fighters 💣 Air Warriors | Smithsonian Channel
Smithsonian Channel Aviation Nation

Top to Bottom: Kobe, Iwo Jima, Tinian

It is 1,500 miles from Tinian in the Mariana Islands to Kobe, Japan. Iwo Jima is right at the halfway point between them.

B-29 and P-51 : Forging Air Supremacy from Iwo Jima
After Action Report

Ilyushin Il-2

Ilyushin Il-2 - Romain Hugault
Romain Hugault is a comic book artist

Wikipedia - Production

In early 1941, the Il-2 was ordered into production at four factories, and was eventually produced in greater numbers than any other military aircraft in aviation history, but by the time Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941, only State Aviation Factory No. 18 at Voronezh and Factory No. 381 at Leningrad had commenced production, with 249 having been built by the time of the German attack.

Production early in the war was slow because after the German invasion the aircraft factories near Moscow and other major cities in western Russia had to be moved east of the Ural Mountains. Ilyushin and his engineers had time to reconsider production methods, and two months after the move Il-2s were again being produced. The tempo was not to Premier Stalin's liking, however, and he issued the following telegram to Shenkman and Tretyakov:

You have let down our country and our Red Army. You have the nerve not to manufacture IL-2s until now. Our Red Army now needs IL-2 aircraft like the air it breathes, like the bread it eats. Shenkman produces one IL-2 a day, and Tretyakov builds one or two MiG-3s daily. It is a mockery of our country and the Red Army. I ask you not to try the government's patience, and demand that you manufacture more ILs. This is my final warning. — Stalin

As a result, "the production of Shturmoviks rapidly gained speed. Stalin's notion of the Il-2 being 'like bread' to the Red Army took hold in Ilyushin's aircraft plants, and the army soon had their Shturmoviks available in quantity."

Il-2 Destroys Bridge - The PIlot
Johnny's War Stories

I think the above video is from the movie The Pilot. A Battle for Survival. It was made in  Russia in 1980, so before the collapse of the Soviet Union, so it's basically a Soviet movie. Sounds like a good story though.

Ilyushin IL-2 Sturmovik | The Flying Tank | Armored Plane of soviet russia in WW2 #sturmovik #il2
Info Cafe

I suspect the audio on this video is artificial, but the script is pretty good: coherent and plausible. Maybe a little excessive boasting about killing German tanks at Kursk, I dunno. I know that Kursk was a big battle, but I never heard much about aircraft there.

Previous Il-2 post.

Supermarine Spitfire

Supermarine Spitfire Grey Nurse

Grey Nurse was a member of No. 457 Squadron RAAF that was transferred to Australia in 1942. It's now in the Temora Air Museum in Australia:

This aircraft was the last Spitfire acquired by the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) with the original Military serial number A58-758. It was built by Supermarine in England in 1944, test flown and then shipped to Australia. The Air Force took delivery of the aircraft in April 1945, and, with World War II drawing to a close, the aircraft was not required on active service and was instead placed into storage.

A few years ago the airplane was modified to add a second seat for a passenger and now is giving rides.

Royal Air Force:

The iconic Supermarine Spitfire was critical in defeating Luftwaffe air attacks during the Battle of Britain in 1940. More Spitfires were built than any other British combat aircraft before or since World War Two - 20,341 in total. There are five Spitfires on the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight.

SPITFIRE Mk. IXb - Flown as it should be! | Flying Legends
PaddyPatrone

SPITFIRE (2018) | Official Trailer | Altitude Films
Altitude Films Links:

Wikipedia page
Duck Me 2
Catapult to Oblivion

Short Sunderland Mark V

Short Sunderland Mark V

Extract from Wikipedia:

The Short S.25 Sunderland is a British flying boat patrol bomber. The aircraft took its service name from the port of Sunderland in North East England.

The Sunderland was fitted with various offensive and defensive armaments, including machine gun turrets, bombs, aerial mines, and depth charges. The Sunderland was powered by four Bristol Pegasus XVIII radial engines and was fitted with various detection equipment to aid combat operations, including the Leigh searchlight, the ASV Mark II and ASV Mark III radar units, and an astrodome.

During WW2, the type was heavily involved in Allied efforts to counter the threat posed by German U-boats in the Battle of the Atlantic. On 17 July 1940, an RAAF Sunderland performed the type's first unassisted U-boat kill.

During the post-war era, use of the Sunderland throughout Europe rapidly declined, while greater numbers remained in service in the Far East, where large developed runways were less prevalent. Several squadrons of RAF Sunderlands saw combat action during the Korean War. Around a dozen aircraft also participated in the Berlin airlift.

Several examples have been preserved, including a single airworthy Sunderland which has been placed on display in Florida at Fantasy of Flight.

Cutaway drawing of Short Sunderland Mk. II
Captions might be in Russian

The WWII Flying Porcupine With 16 Guns
IsonzoEnjoyer

The Leigh Light, an unusual device used by British aircraft to combat German submarines U-boat WW2
JOHN WAKE

The image at top is artwork for a Special Hobby plastic model kit.

Fairey Swordfish

Avenging the Hood - Ron Cole

Wikipedia:

The Fairey Swordfish is a retired biplane torpedo bomber, designed by the Fairey Aviation Company. Originating in the early 1930s, the Swordfish, nicknamed "Stringbag", was principally operated by the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy. It was also used by the Royal Air Force (RAF), as well as several overseas operators, including the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) and the Royal Netherlands Navy. It was initially operated primarily as a fleet attack aircraft. During its later years, the Swordfish was increasingly used for anti-submarine and training duties. The type was in frontline service throughout the Second World War.

Despite being obsolescent, the Swordfish achieved some spectacular successes during the war, including sinking one battleship and damaging two others belonging to the Regia Marina (the Italian navy) during the Battle of Taranto, and the famous attack on the German battleship Bismarck, which contributed to her eventually being sunk. Swordfish sank a greater tonnage of Axis shipping than any other Allied aircraft during the war. The Swordfish remained in front-line service until V-E Day, having outlasted some of the aircraft intended to replace it.

Fairey Swordfish LS326/L2 Start Up & Take Off
LeicesterPilot

Swordfish Attack Bismarck
Spiral Film Clips

Fairey Swordfish flight deck operations
Armoured Archivist
I posted this image before.
Swordfish Takeoff Duxford - short video
Swordfish | Battle of Britain Airshow - short video

Japanese Zero

Mitsubishi A6M Zero

Paraphrased from Wikipedia:

The Mitsubishi Zero is a long-range carrier-capable fighter aircraft. It was operated by the Imperial Japanese Navy from 1940 to 1945. The Zero got its name from 0 being the last digit of the imperial year 2600 (1940) when it entered service with the Navy.

In early combat operations, the Zero achieved an outstanding kill ratio of 12 to 1, but by mid-1942 a combination of new tactics and the introduction of better equipment enabled Allied pilots to engage the Zero on generally equal terms. By mid 1943 the deterioration of fighter pilot training in the IJNAS contributed to making the Zero less effective against newer Allied fighters.

By 1944, the A6M had fallen behind Allied fighters in speed and was regarded as outdated but still capable if operated by trained pilots. The Zero continued to serve in a front-line role until the end of the war in the Pacific. During the final phases, it was adapted for use in kamikaze operations. Japan produced nearly eleven thousand Zeros during the war.

Mitsubishi A6M5 Zero Model 52 Cockpit

The wreck of a Zero on the Japanese Airbase on Taroa, Maloelap Atoll

Pearl Harbor flight featuring the PoF Mitsubishi A6M5 Zero
Voodoo1650

Mitsubishi A6M Zero - Basic Facts
Johnny Johnson
Previous Zero post.

Vought F4U-4 Corsair

F4U-4 Corsair
Picture from RC Model

Wikipedia:

The Vought F4U Corsair is an American fighter aircraft that saw service primarily in World War II and the Korean War. Designed and initially manufactured by Chance Vought, the Corsair was soon in great demand; additional production contracts were given to Goodyear, whose Corsairs were designated FG, and Brewster, designated F3A.

The Corsair was designed and principally operated as a carrier-based aircraft, and entered service in large numbers with the U.S. Navy and Marines in World War II. It quickly became one of the most capable carrier-based fighter-bombers of the war. Some Japanese pilots regarded it as the most formidable American fighter, and U.S. naval aviators' claims suggested an 11:1 kill ratio. Early problems with carrier landings and logistics led to it being eclipsed as the dominant carrier-based fighter by the Grumman F6F Hellcat, powered by the same Double Wasp engine first flown on the Corsair's initial prototype in 1940. The Corsair's early deployment was to land-based squadrons of the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy.

The Corsair served almost exclusively as a fighter-bomber throughout the Korean War and during the French colonial wars in Indochina and Algeria. In addition to its use by the U.S. and British, the Corsair was also used by the Royal New Zealand Air Force, French Naval Aviation, and other air forces until the 1960s.

From the prototype delivery to the U.S. Navy in 1940, to final delivery in 1953 to the French, 12,571 F4U Corsairs were manufactured in 16 separate models. Its 1942–1953 production run was the longest of any U.S. piston-engined fighter.

Cutaway Display of a Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp Aircraft Engine

Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp 46L 18-cylinder engine

Vought F4U Corsair - In The Movies
Johnny Johnson

DEVOTION Clip - "North Korean + Chinese Border" (2023) War
JoBlo Movie Clips